


Aisling

by Talan (soracia)



Category: Original Work
Genre: Dark, F/M, Fantasy, One Shot, Short, Weirdness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2002-11-23
Updated: 2002-11-23
Packaged: 2017-10-24 09:27:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/261789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/soracia/pseuds/Talan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The end of a search for a long-held dream...or is it? Written for the November original writing short story challenge at MYSTCommunity, but heavily influenced by the previous September challenge.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Aisling

**Author's Note:**

> Wellll, it's rough. Also it suffers somewhat from the nearly unconscious state of the writer at the late hour in which the last parts of it were written. And from chopping to keep it to the required length, but it is almost exactly two pages in Word. My first attempt at writing entirely in present tense; I don't use it very often, but this story just came out that way somehow.

He still sees her in his dreams, though more often now they are nightmares. He has gone far, perhaps too far, looking for her; the woman he sees in his dreams, for he swore he would search even to the farthest reaches of the land, and not rest until he found her. She is beautiful, with long hair like rippling gold, and deep blue eyes, wise and thoughtful. Her lips are red and smile often, her voice sweet and her speech gentle. She moves with a slender grace, a dancer even as she walks. Everything he could wish for, and more.

So he has wandered long through towns and villages, on highways and roads which have no names. Always he looks for her in the faces of those he meets, lovely enough perhaps, but none who match her perfection. At one inn in a village a few miles from the sea, a dark-haired beauty with laughing eyes serves him a hot meal, and tries to engage him in conversation, but he takes no notice of her. He is searching for the perfect woman of his dreams, however long it takes, and he has no interest in any other. He answers the girl's questions as shortly as possible without being truly rude, and after a time she lets him be, disappointed. He does not see the sympathy in her glance as she leaves, nor would he understand it if he had. It does not occur to him that his search marks his face, so that she sees his weariness and soreness of heart, and guesses partly the cause of it.

He goes on toward the sea through the forested wilderness, several days journey on foot. At last he comes to a lonely place by the shore, a small cove sheltered by the trees. It is twilight, and the mist hangs ghostly in the air, making him slightly uneasy as he studies the shoreline. He shakes off the feeling as foolishness, and begins to turn away, when suddenly he sees her. The woman he has dreamed of standing at the edge of the wood, as if she had been waiting for him. He stares in amazement, unable to believe his eyes, at the white vision framed by the dark trees. He must have fallen asleep already and be dreaming.

She smiles at him, and holds out her hand. He goes to her, hesitantly, afraid to touch her lest she vanish, but drawn to her irresistably. Her presence seems to radiate from her like warmth, or light. She is like a vision, a dream come to life. She takes his hand, saying, "Come." He follows her down a path behind her that he had not seen, leading a short way into the wood.

Out of sight of the shore, the path ends at a wide stone arch with three shallow steps, set in a vine covered stone wall. Past it is visible a large courtyard and a broad, rambling stone house. Not exactly a house, nor yet a castle, in spite of the stone tower that rises from one side of it, half again as high as the roof. He stands in the archway for a minute, taking in the surreal mystery of the place, strangely familiar from his dreams. It seems bigger than it should have been inside the surrounding walls, but he had not seen them well in the near dark.

Beyond the wide openness of the central court, a half wild garden of mostly roses climbs the walls and every tree as high as the branches allow, as if trying to escape. Traces of paths are barely visible among them. The tower could be taken for another tree, entwined as it is from top to bottom in vines and blossoms. The profusion of greenery covers even the house in the rear, kept from surrounding by the paved court. The dark wood outside towers above the walls, leaning over them like faceless watchmen, shrouded in the heavy mist. He turns back to her with wonder in his eyes. "So this is where you are. At last I have found you."

Her warm smile and shining eyes mirror his own joy. "I knew you would come one day," she says simply. "Welcome to the house of dreams." It was truly the place he has known in his dreams; it feels like coming home, and he accepts it without question. He does not ask how she had known he would come, or what her dreams have been. He knows her, he knows this place, as well as his own name; it is like a part of himself.

He is unsurprised to find the inside as familiar as the outside, where he knows each wide wood paneled hallway and every large, comfortable room for eating, sleeping, or sitting by a fire. The huge library holds all his favorite books, and the walls are hung with copies of his favorite works of art. The strangeness of the night, of finding her, and finally ending his search, wears off quickly. The natural rhythm of life takes hold, and he settles into a pattern of days, living quietly in the house he knows so well as if he had always been there. They spend their hours talking, laughing, reading, dancing--always together, doing whatever is their wish of the moment. He never tires of watching her, listening to the sound of her voice and her silver laugh.

For many days, the unbroken peace of the quiet life lulls him into simple contentment. He thinks nothing of the world outside, nor does he miss his lonely wandering. He needs nothing, asks nothing, but to see her smile and feel the warmth of her hand in his. A vague unsettled feeling haunts him occasionally at the darkest hours of night, but that is easily brushed aside. And yet, it grows stronger as the weeks go by, a restlessness, a feeling of something not right.

At last he can no longer ignore it, and he asks her if she feels it. She gives him an odd look; so, it has come to this already. Even if she could keep him here another week or month, it is too late. He will not stay...no one ever stays...She is silent for a long moment. "Why did you come here?"

"I was looking for you," he answers, as if that should be obvious.

She shakes her head. "No. You were looking for her, the woman you dreamed of, a perfect woman. Such a woman can only be found in a dream."

He blinks, looking stunned, as if someone had slapped him. "But I...you--"

"A dream," she repeats, in a cool tone, as if does not really matter much. "That is what you have found. Perfection does not exist in reality, only in ideals. Reality always has minor flaws; they provide the contrast by which we measure the excellent. To appreciate beauty or joy, you must first see ugliness and pain. Expecting perfection in life, looking in truth for what exists only in your own mind, is very near the edge of madness. What kind of burden do you place on this world, demanding to find what cannot be? And so you have come here, the only place where dreams exist."

He pulls away, turning to examine the house and garden in a new light, thoroughly awakened now, suddenly aware of the twisted undercurrent everywhere, the threatening wood leaning over the walls, the wild fury of the garden, the surreal structure of the house, the wrongness of this place singing along his every nerve. "What is this place?" He stares around in horror, feeling betrayed by the fading illusion.

She stands, still and silent now, not attempting to fight a battle already lost. He looks back at her, but her face is blank, her eyes empty, eerily void of the person he had thought to be there. No longer a person at all, but a reflection of what a person might be. A form of beauty without a soul, as if she were a living statue. "You are not real," he says mechanically, trying to realize the harsh truth of it. "None of this is real."

"What is real?" she asks, expressionless. "What makes a dream any less real than life? It is what you make it. It would be real enough if you knew nothing else. There are few who see their dreams truly enough to recognize them when they are found in reality. This is a place where dreams come to life. If you come here with a dream, you will find it. Not because it exists, but because you are looking for it."

She smiles at him then, a cold, brittle smile. "People see what they want to see," she says. "You were looking for her, and so you found her, but that does not mean she exists. There is nothing here but what you bring with you. Terrible things have been seen here, but not of my doing. What happens here is only what is in your mind. What you wish, what you fear--or what you remember, if it is strong enough. This place does not do. It simply is."

He shudders. "It is evil," he answers fiercely.

"No. But it is soulless, which can be sometimes more dangerous. Nothing here can harm you, unless you believe it can. There is nothing here that you would call real. But you were not looking for anything real."

He thinks of the time he has wasted looking for his dream, time lost forever with nothing to show for it. He thinks of the laughter in a pair of dark eyes, a face of kindness and concern. He thinks of the hollow feeling left by endless days of perfect sameness. And he leaves her there, the house and walls crumbling, the tower falling among the withered roses, and the mist swirling around her.


End file.
